T. William Altermatt, Laura Rouse, Douglas Ritter, Mackenzie Seymour, & LaVerna King

1. “Women and Children First” Implicit Associations between Women and Childlike Qualities Predict Explicit Negative Attitudes toward Women in the Military T. William Altermatt,Laura Rouse, Douglas Ritter, Mackenzie Seymour, & LaVerna King University of Michigan-Flint

2. Introduction The last message transmitted by the Titanic was “Have cleared boats and filled them with women and children.” The protection of children is accepted because children are considered more vulnerable and less competent than adults. We suspected that chivalrous norms of protecting and caring for women (such as the “women and children first” policy) may be based in part on a tendency to overgeneralize childlike traits to women. We expect that 1) there is a general tendency to implicitly associate women with childlike traits, and 2) the strength of this tendency is related to attitudes toward women in dangerous or adultlike roles.

3. The Implicit Association Test (IAT)(Greenwald, McGhee, & Schwartz, 1998) • Computer-mediated test of the implicit (automatic) association between two concepts. • Uses reaction-time • Based on premise that the strength of mental associations between two concepts corresponds to the ease with which the two concepts can be treated as a single concept. • Rudman, Greenwald, & McGhee (2001) found a significant implicit association between gender and power. • McConnell & Leibold (2001) found that an IAT measure of racism predicted subtle nonverbal discriminatory behavior but did not predict explicit self-reported racism.

4. Methods • Participants • N = 71 (66% female, 85% white, median age 22) • Materials • Gender-Power IAT (Rudman et al., 2001) • Gender-Age IAT • Women in the Military Scale (Hurrell & Lukens, 1994) • Procedure • Participants completed the three measures alone on a computer. • Order of measures and stimuli was randomized.

5. Measuring Female-Childlike Implicit Association INSTRUCTIONS: As quickly as possible…Press left key if word is a MALE name or an adult trait. Press right key if word is a FEMALE name or a childlike trait. assertiveLISABRIANinnocentsimpleMATTHEWcynicalPAULBETHsternMEGAN… MALEoradult FEMALEorchildlike

6. Measuring Male-Childlike Implicit Association INSTRUCTIONS: As quickly as possible…Press left key if word is a FEMALE name or an adult trait. Press right key if word is a MALE name or a childlike trait. assertiveLISABRIANinnocentsimpleMATTHEWcynicalPAULBETHsternMEGAN… FEMALEoradult MALEorchildlike

7. Hypothesis 1: Gender-Age IAT If there is a stronger implicit association between female names and childlike traits than there is between male names and childlike traits, then participants should respond more quickly when they use the same key to indicate ‘female name or childlike trait’ than when the same key is used to indicate ‘male name or childlike trait.’ • Hypothesis 1: Reaction time will be significantly lower (faster) in the Female-Childlike condition than in the Male-Childlike condition. • This difference will be observed when traits are negative (cynical, vulnerable) or positive (adorable, wise).

8. Implicit Association between Gender and Age-Related Traits Participants responded faster when female-childlike words were combined than when male-childlike words were combined (adorable,wise) (delicate, stern) (vulnerable, cynical) Valence of Traits Note. *p = .06, **p < .001

9. This correlation was significant for female participants, r (47) = -.32, p < .03. Not significant for male participants, r (24) = -.05, p >.8. The correlation for female participants remained after controlling for their implicit association between gender and power, r (44) = -.30, p < .05 Hypothesis: The strength of individuals’ implicit associations between women and childlike traits will be negatively correlated to their attitudes toward women in the military. Hypothesis 2: Women in the military

10. Discussion Using an implicit measure of the strength of people’s association between gender and age-related traits, we found a general tendency to associate women with childlike traits. The strength of this association predicted explicit attitudes toward women in the military, but only among female participants. This association was not moderated by an implicit association between gender and power. These results suggest that there is a general implicit association between women and childlike traits and that this association may play a role in women’s explicit attitudes related to the protection (but exclusion) of women in dangerous contexts. Further research is needed to examine the correlates of the gender-age association in other domains, such as hiring and promotion in high-agency jobs.

11. References • Greenwald, A., McGhee, D., Schwartz, J. (1998). Measuring individual • differences in implicit cognition: The implicit association test. Journal of Personality & Social Psychology, 74, 1464-1480. • Hurrell, R. M., & Lukens, J. H. (1994). Attitudes toward women in the • military during the Persian Gulf War. Perceptual and Motor Skills, 78, 99-104. • McConnell, A. , & Leibold, J. (2001). Relations among the Implicit • Association Test, discriminatory behavior, and explicit measures of racial attitudes. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 37, 435-442. • Rudman, L., Greenwald, A., & McGhee, D. (2001). Implicit self- • concept and evaluative implicit gender stereotypes: Self and ingroup share desirable traits. Personality & Social Psychology Bulletin, 27, 1164-1178.